Direct Manipulation of Isosurfaces and Cutting Planes in Virtual Environments

This paper presents some novel interface techniques for the visualization of scalar field data in virtual reality environments. In particular, we discuss the direct manipulation of isosurfaces and cutting planes and give general guidelines for design of user interfaces and algorithms for scientific visualization in virtual environments. This work was motivated by the need to visualize scalar field data from computation fluid dynamics calculations interactively in the Virtual Wind Tunnel at NASA Ames, but the techniques are applicable to other problem areas, including medical imaging and geological and mathematical visualization. Copies of this report are available from: NAS Applied Research Branch Mail Stop T045-1 NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field, CA 94035 1. This work is supported through NASA contract NAS2-12961. Direct Manipulation of Isosurfaces and Cutting Planes in Virtual Environments Tom Meyer Department of Computer Science Box 1910 Brown University Providence RI 02912 (401) 863-7693 [email protected] Al Globus Computer Science Corporation MS T045-1 NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field CA 94035-1000 (415) 604-4404 [email protected] ABSTRACT This paper presents some novel interface techniques for the visualization of scalar field data in virtual reality (VR) environments. In particular, we discuss the direct manipulation of isosurfaces and cutting planes and give general guidelines for design of user interfaces and algorithms for scientific visualization in virtual environments. This work was motivated by the need to visualize scalar field data from computational fluid dynamics (CFD) calculations interactively in the Virtual Wind Tunnel at NASA Ames, but the techniques are applicable to other problem areas, including medical imaging and geological and mathematical visualization.This paper presents some novel interface techniques for the visualization of scalar field data in virtual reality (VR) environments. In particular, we discuss the direct manipulation of isosurfaces and cutting planes and give general guidelines for design of user interfaces and algorithms for scientific visualization in virtual environments. This work was motivated by the need to visualize scalar field data from computational fluid dynamics (CFD) calculations interactively in the Virtual Wind Tunnel at NASA Ames, but the techniques are applicable to other problem areas, including medical imaging and geological and mathematical visualization.